Originally posted by Kev367th
Dok, I see what your getting at but it will never happen, for the following reasons-
i) I would imagine that HT main player base is from the U.S.
ii) Newbs coming to the game usually look for one of the big 4 (Spit/Pony/109/190)
iii) Apart from the early models most of those are lower than ENY 10.
iv) A system that perks the Pony D at any level woud probably hurt HTC see (i) and (ii).
As for people charging into furballs, whats wrong with that?
I haven't been on recently (waiting for fix for the warpy/slidy/vanishing planes), but when the XVI was introduced there were a great many more furballs.
The reason the La7 wasn't perked was that although there certainly was a lot of them it never really managed a K/D much higher the 1.1 to 1.2, i.e. it didn't dominate the MA.
At the moment the XVI is in the same category, yup theres a lot of them, but it hasn't managed a K/D much over 1.1 . Now if it suddenly starts hitting 1.5+, then I think it may happen to get perked.
Still say the answer is to have more choices, not restrict the choices available.
[...]
Based on what I see in the MA, the reason the La7 has such a rotten K/D is that it seems to spend half its combat time in enemy AAA. If an enemy La7 is anywhere near your field, you pretty much know what it's there for. So it gets a pass or two or three - gets its one kill - and dies. Voila, K/D around 1.00.
On any nite you can also see almost ritualistic mass suicide JABO attacks by P51's. Why the 51? Because it carries a mess of ORD and it climbs better than a P47 and dives better than a P38. As such, its pretty much unstoppable.
What I'm suggesting is that if your "style of play" is not only prone to dying a lot, but has that designed in, you're just going to have to use a 2nd tier plane to get your kicks or be effective enough to spend 2 or 3 Perks per flight. No plane is "unavailable" ... just that if you insist on throwing away planes eventually the base CO will take away the keys to the good stuff unless you slip him a few perks under the table.
I'm actually looking at a bigger picture here. Take the typical La7 runway vultcher. Because he's so fast he can almost always boom in on a enemy runway (defended or not, makes no difference) and eventually find someone rolling to pounce on. He gets his "thrill" and gives up a death he doesn't care about anyway ... cuz ... well ... he sucks and he knows it.
But -- this player has learned nothing on that last flight. All he did was "lather-rinse-repeat." His skill has not improved and all he really did in terms of the flow of the MA is waste the time of 3 or 4 enemies chasing him down to his evential demise - because the outcome is never in doubt.
If after 3 or 4 consecutive deaths the host said "no more" and forced him to use an La5 or Fw190A to carry out his missions (or pay perks for an La7) that will affect either his style of play (can't die every time) or how automatic his kill is ... unless he decides to learn to freakin' fly a lesser plane.
Same metaphor applies to the Spit16. If a player insists on dieing every time he should be stepped back to a lesser variant, or pay the perks. He can still furball his tiny pea brain out - he just can't out-climb 3/4 of the other planes any more.
